Surrounded by vineyards, mountains and small-town charm, Lake Chelan in North-Central Washington offers is more than 50 miles of crystal clear, glacier-fed water. A popular summer tourist destination, it is also home to a variety of family-friendly venues including SlideWaters waterpark and the High Trek Chalen high ropes course,. The newest facility is Lakeside Surf that now operates the world’s largest stationary wave. It is also the home of the Continental Surf Cup.
‘We have the largest and the greatest river wave in the world,’ says ,’ Lakeside Surf co-owner, Robert Bordner. ‘It’s 16m wide and we can move up to 750 thousand gallons of water a minute. This is the largest in the world by width.’
When planning began in 2016, the facility’s audio and visual needs fell to Focus Partners. ‘While we serve a lot of churches’ audio and visual needs, we also frequently work with indoor and outdoor arenas and expansive event complexes,’ says CEO and founder, Dave Dartnall. ‘Lakeside Surf was our first outdoor theme park that included water sports and activities, as well as a variety of multi-use zones throughout the complex.’
Focus installed sound and video production and display systems throughout the venue, along with Danley Sound loudspeakers.
For Phase I, Focus selected the Danley OS80 outdoor loudspeaker as well as the OS115 outdoor subwoofer along with a DNA 10K4 Pro amplifier with DSP controls to power the speakers. A temporary structure was built for mounting the speakers until Phase 2 construction was completed.
‘We chose Danley speakers because they provided the best sound quality, pattern control and power for expansion,’ Dartnall says. ‘This set up provides simplicity for possible upgrades overtime to more Danley loudspeakers for future venue development.’
Dartnall points out that the largest wave doesn’t come without its own set of difficulties from an acoustical perspective: ‘The pool’s 12 generators move an enormous amount of water and they are not silent. So, above the gentle roar of those generators, people are surprised how well this one set of full-range speakers work. They are consistently impressed by how well music and speaking can be heard and how pleasant and even the sound is even at great distances.’
More: www.danleysoundlabs.com
